Cleaning machines for reusable food containers, such as bottles and the like, have, besides the actual cleaning of such containers, the task to securely remove labels or the like from the containers. For this purpose, the bottles provided with the labels are, after a certain presoftening period, impinged by spray nozzles or the like with liquid.
In a known machine of this type, the bottles with the labels thereon are transported in bottle-receiving cell in loops through the machine whereby in the respective lower transition region of the loop are troughs arranged into which the labels are washed off from a station arranged above the troughs. However, these known arrangements do not always assure a positive removal of the labels from the bottles, especially since part of the labels will remain suspended on the conveyor and carried by the latter into following baths. In addition, in this known arrangement the bottles do not change their position during the removal of the labels, whereby the labels may be clamped in the cells at points where the bottles abut against the respective cells and thus be not properly removed from the bottles.